Errors and Omissions

Corrections tally - day 4

A couple of observations:

1) Counting corrections accurately is hard. Every paper has its own method. The NY Times, WSJ and Houston Chronicle have the most straightforward and transparent approach. They create corrections columns every day, referencing and linking to articles in the past. Other papers, such as the Washington Post, LA Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer, date their corrections to the date of the story, making it more difficult to know how many corrections were issued on a particular day (and additionally requiring counters like me to revise daily figures after the fact).

2) The Atlanta-Journal Constitution corrections system is a mess, as I said yesterday, and I haven't been able to find a single correction for the Dallas Morning News in the entire time I've monitored them. I doubt they've never made a mistake. Help!

A final note: the ombudsman from the Raleigh News & Observer wrote a column recently where he performed and assessed a similar corrections tally. Read it here. (Thanks, Regret the Error.)

newspapers, media, errors

posted by Unknown @ 6/02/2006 09:11:00 AM